Spiritual Warfare: Time to Pray! –Pt. 1

A young father came home from work one day exhausted. Nothing had gone right at the office, his boss was angry, and there was an accident on the freeway making him late for dinner. At the table, he told his wife and two kids about how his project at work wasn’t coming together the way it should. Suddenly, his five-year-old daughter put down her fork and put her hand on his arm. She looked up at him with big serious eyes and said, “Did you pray about it, Daddy?” That stopped him in his tracks. No, he hadn’t. He hadn’t done the most obvious thing in the world.

Remember to Pray

Prayer is the heart of spiritual warfare. It seems obvious, but the first thing to remember is to pray. Sometimes it’s easy to talk about how we’re under an attack of the enemy. (As someone once said, “Well, what are you doing under there?!”) It’s easy to think about all the things that aren’t going right, but we forget to pray! (For more on thinking versus praying, go here.) A great place to start in prayer is with praise. We talked about this when we started this series back in November with “Spiritual Weapons: Praise.” Praise and worship are powerful. Taking time to exalt the Lord gets our eyes on Him and on His power.

In Jesus’ Name

As we move into praying specifically to break any chains of the enemy, we need to always remember that we pray “in Jesus’ Name.” We have no power on our own. We always stand under the umbrella of the authority of Jesus. Our Lord Jesus, who was born of a virgin, crucified on a cross for our sins and raised from the dead to life by the power of God, is the One with all the power.

By Faith in the Name

Peter spoke and healed people by the authority of Jesus name in Acts 3. He came by a lame man who was crippled from birth. Peter said to him, “In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk” (Act. 3:6b.) The man stood up and walked. Later, talking about this miracle, Peter said, “By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has completely healed him, as you can all see,” (Acts 3:16.)

Great explanation, Peter! 😉 Notice he didn’t say, “Because I am Peter and I walked with Jesus, I was able to heal you myself.” Um … no. In the same way, just because we are Christians and we know that Lord doesn’t mean we can work miracles ourselves or that we can make Satan vacate the premises ourselves. “It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him…”

By Faith in His Power

Notice it’s not that Jesus’ Name is a good luck charm or the magic word. The name of Jesus is not a talisman of any kind. It’s not like, as long as you say that when you pray, you can make things come true. See the difference in that statement? We do not make things happen. We are submitted to God’s will in prayer and we are really declaring His power over the enemy that He has already defeated.

I often pray something like this: “In Jesus name, I stand against the enemy and I cast down all of his works. Anything he would bring against me, I completely destroy. I will not accept this attack on (fill in the blank!) my body, my marriage, my family, my bank account, my career, etc. By the power of the blood of Jesus, I command him to be gone! He has no place in my life. I am a child of God and I walk in His ways. I am forgiven and the Bible says, ‘No weapon formed against me will prosper,’ so I call this attempt to derail me, ‘Done!’ In Jesus Name, Amen.”

This is taking a stand against the enemy in prayer and in Jesus’ Name. We need to pray! We need to pray about everything and we need to pray specifically. The Lord is ready and waiting to answer our prayers.

For a three-minute video on asking the Lord for what we need, join me on my YouTube channel here.

For an amazing song by Darlene Zschech called “In Jesus Name,” click here.

Take a stand against the enemy this week. In prayer. In Jesus Name. Amen!